2.3 KiB
2.3 KiB
Criminal Justice System Discrimination
POC are imprisoned longer and subject to minimum sentencing laws far more than white people: data indicates judge biases and institutional causes.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission 17
- Black men who commit the same crimes as white men receive federal prison sentences that are, on average, nearly 20 percent longer
- The black/white sentencing disparities are being driven in large part by “non-government sponsored departures and variances”
- This means that sentencing choices are made by judges at their own discretion.
- University of Michigan Law School: Starr and Rehavi 14
- All other factors being equal, black offenders were 75 percent more likely to face a charge carrying a mandatory minimum sentence than a white offender who committed the same crime.
- Justice Policy Institute 07
- Whites and African Americans report using and selling drugs at similar rates, but African Americans go to prison for drug offenses at higher rates than whites
- In 2002, African Americans were admitted to prison for drug offenses at 10 times the rate of whites in the largest population counties in the country.
- Mitchell 05 (non-paywall)
- Meta-analysis of 71 studies
- “Analyses indicate that African-Americans generally are sentenced more harshly than whites; the magnitude of this race effect is statistically significant but small and highly variable”
- High variability is explained by differences in methodology between studies